Midnight Oil

[Powderworks] Re: NMOC: MP3/WMA Technical Quesitons

Miron Mizrahi mironmizrahi at yahoo.com
Tue Mar 16 17:23:20 MST 2004


--- "Maurice R. Kelly" <mkelly at chatswood.org.uk> wrote:
> On Mar 15, Miron Mizrahi wrote:

> 
> Arse to that. I don't mean to troll but I get a little bored of
> the whole
> "MP3 is not good enough for trade" line. If MP3s are a decent
> enough
> quality (me, I'm generally happy with 160kbps or higher) I'm happy
> to
> trade MP3s. Considering I MP3 all CDs I own anyway, trading MP3s
> saves me
> ripping and encoding. I only listen to CDs in the car now so I
> really
> don't care about a single generation loss of quality when I make a
> CD from
> the traded MP3s.
> 
> I do draw the line at people trading CDs made from MP3s -
> successive
> generations of CD -> MP3 -> CD -> MP3 is bad.

no need to keep the gloves on Maurice - I can handle the f word :) 
you are not trolling (not by my standards anyway) and I really don't
want to have an argument here since I don't think we can convince
each other so let's agree to disagree. it is ultimately a personal
choice. wav is superior to mp3 (I hope you agree) and this does not
seem to be an issue for any other trading community I am a memeber
of but if you have reasons to opt for the lesser quality product it
is your choice. I would however like to point out 2 things:

1. when you trade mp3s you should make it known it is the case
2. it is hard to know when the line you are trying to draw is
crossed. it is easier with wav and easiest with shn/flac. 

> 
> Whilst MP3s are essentially public domain, that isn't necessarily
> always
> going to be the case. In fact I read recently that the Fraunhofer
> Institute (who seem to be one of the primary contributors to the
> MP3
> standard) had brought out a DRM solution for MP3s which means that
> MP3s
> could soon be as restrictive as WMA files.
> 
> I also believe that the Frauhofer Institute have patents on
> technologies
> in MP3 and they may try to enforce those in the future (if they
> haven't
> already done so.)
> 
> If you want freedom - look at Ogg Vorbis.
> http://www.xiph.org/ogg/vorbis/
> Of course it's not so good for hardware like DVD players and
> portable
> devices - but that may change. Personally I'm not changing my
> 5000+ MP3s
> in the near future!

I was not aware of this but there is one fundamental diff between
FHG and microsoft. microsoft has the power to force a standard (if
we let it). FHG does not. once it tries, people will shift to
something else. to the best of my knowledge FHG has not yet done so.
the problem with ogg vorbis is that it really offers no significant
advantage over mp3 so unless mp3 loses its appeal (due to what you
said above) then I doubt Ogg will make it to the appliances market.
note however that it takes about 5-7 years from the creation of the
standard to its adoption by the appliance makers. dvd took about 7
years and we are now seeing dvd players that can play mpeg4 videos
(divx/xvid). so who knows?


> Solid state players are cool, but you're forgetting another
> category, and
> that's hard-disk based devices. My experience with an iPod has
> been
> amazing. I've got about 28Gigs of music on it at the minute. It's
> easy to
> use, seems reliable enough (aside from this battery malarkey that
> I've yet
> to encounter,) and it switches between a portable device and a
> component
> to your hifi seamlessly. (E.g. last week I came into the flat
> while
> listening to a particularly good track by Underworld. WHilst still
> listening through the headphones, I dropped the iPod into the dock
> which
> was plugged into my amplifier. The sound instantly came out of the
> amp
> while still playing in my ears. I could then take the earpohones
> out
> without having missed a beat.)
> 
> In case you haven't gathered I'm an iPod fan now. And this is
> after less
> than 2 months of using it.

you are right. I forgot the 4th type. I must admit that as a techie
dude I am attracted to them but my practical side doesn't like them.
I really don't see the advantage of being able to have 500 cds
stored (ipod) over 10 cds (cd-r). not to mention that I no longer
listen to mp3 anyway. I got on the mp3 bandwagon early (1998) and
once I started trading it lost its appeal.

> 
> > note that if you intend to listen to boot cds I have not been
> able
> > to avoid the gap between songs and it it reeeeealy annoying. the
> gap
> > occurs since the switching from one mp3 track to the next
> involves
> > closing and opening files which is a much lengthier operation
> than
> > moving on to the next audio track.
> 
> Rip the entire CD as one MP3 file. I know some people like random
> access
> to tracks and so on - I personally like listening to a CD from
> start to
> finish so this method works for me.

this will work.


> 
> Apologies to everyone for the non-Oils content. But it is relevant
> to
> enjoyment of Oils - does that count? ;-)

sure does

> 
> -- 
> Maurice R. Kelly
> mkelly at deadheart.org.uk


=====
Miron

   How could people get so unkind?

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